Is your email affected by Diogenes’ syndrome?

Don’t worry, this is not a new kind of virus or fraud that can irreparably damage your computer or drain your finances in a second. Still, if you collect all your emails, never clicking "delete" even when the message is not relevant to you, then your email mayb suffer from the disease that Enrique Dans, a Spanish professor and El Pais columnist, calls “Diogenes Syndrome”.

Diogenes of Sinope was a Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynicism. Despite spending his life trying to reach virtue through poverty and frugality, Diogenes gives the name to a syndrome that manifests itself in association with a pathological collection and storage of objects.

Regarding email management, this is a very young “disease”: a few years ago we couldn’t save all our emails, but today storage is hardly an issue. For example, Gmail in its early days had 1GB of email storage, while others like Yahoo Mail and Hotmail followed suit. Gmail now offers unlimited storage. Over the years the volume of emails we exchange daily has enormously increased as well. As a result, it is very easy, now, to become a Diogenes.

Jose’ Miguel Bolivar - blogger and productivity expert - offers a “seven step prescription” to cure the syndrome:

1. Classify all your incoming messages in 4 folders: To do, I have to, Others have to, To read.
2. Rapidly decide if the content is useful or not: if the information in the email can be useful in the future, save it in the To read folder; if not, just delete it.
3. If the email requires a reply, then reply within 2 minutes or put it into the I have to folder; if an email requires an action from others, put it into the Others have to folder.
4. Give the highest priority to emails in To do or I have to folders
5. Reduce the number of sent messages to reduce the number of incoming messages.
6. Explore and take advantage of the features of your email system that could help you to manage your correspondence.
7. Check your email no more than 3 times a day.

Maybe your inbox is not overrun by thousands of emails, maybe you are not keeping all your Facebook notifications and magic pills advertising as a Diogenes would do, but in any case I think this method is worth a try. Email overload is becoming a productivity issue and Bolivar’s seven steps can be a good starting point to find your own way to be more productive